Rachael Langdon

Name: Rachael Langdon

Gender: Female

Age: 18

Grade: 12

School: Aurora High School

Hobbies and Interests: Writing, Reading, Music, Yoga

Appearance: Rachael is only about 5'1" tall and weighs around 112 pounds. Her body is fairly slim from yoga. Rachael likes to wear very comfortable clothing and often chooses more practical clothing over anything stylish. She likes to wear big sweaters and floor length skirts when it's cold, while in hot weather she will wear loose blouses, t-shirts, and skirts that reach her knees. She also prefers to wear sneakers instead of high heels and usually carries her items in a large mail courier bag.

Rachael's skin is blemish free and pale. She has an oval shaped face, a small nose, thin brown eyebrows, and green eyes. She rarely wears makeup, usually only wearing some if she's at a formal event. She has long, chocolate brown hair that falls past her waist. Rachael takes good care of her hair and tends to wear it in a braid or ponytail that is tied with green hair ribbons. She also likes to wear headbands behind her fringe bangs. Her ears are pierced, although she will only wear small studs. Rachael also takes good care of her teeth, having worn braces in middle school, so she makes sure to floss and brush at least twice a day.

On the day of the trip, Rachael was wearing a light green blouse, a knee length black skirt, and black sneakers, with her hair tied in a braid.

Biography: Rachael Alma Langdon was born May 9th, 1994, in Newport News, Virginia. She was the second child of Aaron and Leanna Langdon, their first child being Rachael's sister Bridget, born eight years earlier. Aaron was an engineer at the Northrop Grumman Shipyard while Leanna was a music teacher at Hampton Roads Academy.

Rachael spent her early life living in Hilton Village. Home life was fairly average for young Rachael. Her parents doted on her as the baby of the family, but did not spoil her. She looked up to her big sister, who in turn was very kind to her, although their age difference did mean that Rachael had to accept that Bridget would sometimes rather play with kids her own age. Most of the time, Rachael would only speak if someone first spoke to her. At home, she would usually be off on her own doing whatever activity interested her, staying out of the way of her parents and sister.

Since late elementary school, Aaron and Leanna began to worry that Rachael's shyness might be a sign of some antisocial tendencies. While Rachael had a fine home life, she had trouble adjusting to situations without her parents or sister present, making it hard for her to open up to others. Rachael would often spend her time alone and away from other students, usually reading or writing. She also had trouble approaching anyone she didn't know, mostly due to nerves and doubts about being liked. Her parents got advice to try and find ways Rachael could become more comfortable around people she didn't know. A psychologist they took her to concluded that she had Social Anxiety Disorder, to which he prescribed some medication to help calm the symptoms. Rachael showed improvement with the medication, being more open to people, although forgetting to take the pills has caused her to have headaches and nausea.

Rachael's parents tried to get her involved in various activities and groups to influence her social skills. They saw how much she enjoyed reading and writing, so they signed her up for a writing club at the local library when she was eight. Rachael began to flourish in the subject of writing. She found such joy writing about fantastic lands and whimsical characters that she would tend to spend her free time working on some writing project to show her family and only her family. The club also helped her make a few friends, as she found it easier to relate to kids with similar interests as her. Aaron and Leanna decided to not get too worried about Rachael's development. They hoped that their support and encouragement would allow her to open up more and attempt to get to know more people.

Rachael's social life began to improve as well. She soon began to hold longer relationships with her classmates and show an openness to them. Rachael also began to open up to her parents more, sharing her daily problems while also coming to them for advice for larger issues such as some doubts she had about her abilities and plans for the future. While it was hard for Rachael to admit these things to her parents, she soon came to trust her parents and tried to be open with them about anything that bothered her.

Towards the end of eighth grade, Aaron received a great promotion to manage one of the shipyards in Seattle, Washington. At the time, Bridget had finished her undergraduate studies at the University of Virginia and was going to stay at the university to enter its law school. Aaron, Leanna, and Rachael packed their bags and moved to Seattle. The move was difficult for Rachael, who was sad to leave her friends and home behind. It took her a while to get comfortable in Seattle, so she used her summer before high school to simply acquaint herself with the city.

Starting her Freshman year of high school in a new city, Rachael was initially nervous and decided to simply fly under the radar for the first few months. She began to open a bit by joining a few clubs, specifically Book Club and Creative Writing Club, while also joining a Newspaper class as a reporter. She picked events that allowed her to read and write more to help improve her skills. It was in these clubs that she found most of her friends, particularly those she met in Book Club. Rachael began taking yoga in middle school, as she enjoyed being able to exercise and relax in a stress-free environment. She took these classes with her mother and continued to take them at a local gym when she moved to Seattle.

Rachael's mother also introduced her to a lot of music. Aside from having an appreciation for classical and operatic music, Rachael was also introduced to lots of popular musicians, some of her favorites including The Beatles, Radiohead, and Bjork. Rachael is always open to listening to new music and creating playlists for workouts and writing sessions.

At home, Rachael's life is pretty average. Rachael is a bit more open around her family. She talks to her parents at dinner and family events, and is always open to speaking with them about her issues, even though she tends to keep her voice at a reasonable level and only speaks when spoken to. Rachael only gets to see Bridget during summer vacation, when Bridget moves back home. The two of them are still fairly close, with Bridget being the kind older sister Rachael looks up to. However, Bridget tends to spend a good amount of her vacation time interning at a local law firm, so Rachael has to accept that her sister can be busy during the break.

Rachael has never been in a relationship before, although recently her friend, Daniel Whitten, confessed his feelings to her. She went to prom with him, but Rachael hasn't figured out how if she feels romantic about him. She hasn't pursued a relationship with him yet, mostly because of the fear of hurting their friendship and with college in the distance

Rachael was recently accepted to the University of Washington and plans to attend the school in the Fall. She hopes to become a novelist, but as a safety net she plans on becoming an English teacher to help encourage young writers and poets. She is on the A-B honor roll, doing well in classes like English and History, while not being as proficient in Science or Math due to not having the same passion in those subjects as she does in English.

In class, Rachael is well behaved and tries to be active enough to earn participation credit. When working with others, Rachael tries to be helpful, but doesn't try to be too forceful with her opinion. While Rachael does get along with most of her classmates, she has had trouble relating to some more aggressive students who are willing to insult her. Despite this, she has tried to put these insults behind her and ignore the person who behaves rudely to her.

Advantages: Rachael has experience in yoga, which keeps her in shape. She is also a very quiet person, which might allow her to fly under the radar.

Disadvantages: Rachael has trouble opening up to anyone outside of her close circle of friends, something that might be a problem if she tries to ally with classmates she is unfamiliar with. Rachael also takes medication for her anxiety issues, and any lack of these pills can cause her to suffer headaches and nausea, which can impede her abilities in the game.

Designated Number: Female student No. 007

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Designated Weapon: Solar-Powered Calculator

Conclusion: Unless this kid has a mental break of truly epic proportions, I can't see this ending too well for her. ...Actually it won't end too well if she goes fruit loopy; the only reason she isn't getting written off is 'cause it totally happened before. - Jim Greynolds

'The above biography is as written by Laurels. No edits or alterations to the author's original work have been made.'

Evaluations


Handled by: Laurels

Kills: None

Killed By: Marcus Leung

Collected Weapons: Solar-Powered Calculator (designated weapon)

Allies: Corey Esposito, Timothy Abrams, Michael Mitchellson, Miles Strickland, Stacy Ramsey

Enemies: Kat Tolstoff, Miranda Millers

Mid-game Evaluation:

Post-Game Evaluation:

Memorable Quotes:

Threads
Below is a list of threads that contain Rachael, in chronological order.

The Past:
 * A Carol of Cookies and Christmas
 * Oh Sweet Summer Child, What Do You Know About Fear?
 * Exposition-->Rising Action
 * Lonely Hearts Club

Pre-Game:
 * All Happy Classes are Alike; Each Unhappy Class is Unhappy in their Own Way.
 * Life is Like a Broken Record
 * Whatever
 * Encyclopedia of Ignorance
 * Rachael, Retail
 * That After Workout Burn
 * A Balcony Scene
 * Night of Magic
 * If You Got It, Ball Out
 * Let's Start Something

V5:  Related Threads in Meanwhile:
 * Rabbit Heart
 * The Heavy Weapons Guy
 * Can't watch TV here, guys. The reception's terrible.
 * Lying on the Streets
 * Stand Your Ground(s)
 * The Best Part of Waking Up
 * ... Into the Fire
 * Affluenza
 * Norwegian Wood
 * The Crazy Kids
 * "Though We May Not Survive It..."
 * J'adoube
 * The Night's Watch

Your Thoughts
''Whether you were a fellow handler in SOTF or just an avid reader of the site, we'd like to know what you thought about Rachael Langdon. What did you like, or dislike, about the character? Let us know here!''

Looking back, I think I was really too hard on Rachael when V5 was going on. I criticized her for not taking action when she could have, without taking into account that to hold back was completely in-character for her and that most of her conflicts were internal, rather than external. She reacted to the game in ways that stem realistically and understandably from who her profile and pregame says she is, and making her more assertive might have been a more exciting read, but would have compromised what she already had going on. So yeah, she's not Laurels's best work (right now I'd say that's his TV2 crew), but she was good and I didn't give her enough credit when she was alive. - backslash